[DISCUSSION] Nations which had colonies in America

[Isabelxxx]

Major European nations: Russia/Spain/England/France/Netherlands/Portugal

Branderburg-Prussia:

Sweden:

Scotland:

Denmark:

Duchy of Courland:

British

    British America (1607– 1783)
        Thirteen Colonies
        British North America (1783 – 1907)
        Indian Reserve (1763–1783)
    British West Indies

Courland

    New Courland (Tobago) (1654–1689)

Danish

    Danish West Indies (1754–1917)
    Greenland (1814 - today)

Dutch

    Dutch Brazil (1630–1654)
    Dutch Guiana (now Guyana and Suriname)
    New Netherland (1609–1667)
    Dutch West Indies and Tobago
    Virgin Islands

French

    New France (1604–1763)
        Acadia (1604–1713)
        Canada (1608–1763)
        Louisiana (1699–1763, 1800–1803)
        Newfoundland (1662–1713)
        Île Royale (1713–1763)
    French Guiana (1763-today)
    French West Indies
    Saint-Domingue (1659–1804, now Haiti)
    Tobago
    Virgin Islands
    France Antarctique (1555–1567)
    Equinoctial France (1612–1615)

Portuguese

    Colonial Brazil (1500–1815) became a Kingdom, United Kingdom of Portugal, Brazil and the Algarves.
    Cisplatina (1808–1822, today Uruguay)
    Barbados (1536–1620)
    French Guiana (1809–1817)

Russian

    Russian America (now Alaska, 1799–1867)

Spanish

    Cuba (until 1898)
    New Granada (1717–1819)
        Captaincy General of Venezuela
    New Spain (1535–1821)
        Nueva Extremadura
        Nueva Galicia
        Nuevo Reino de León
        Nuevo Santander
        Nueva Vizcaya
        Las Californias
        Santa Fe de Nuevo México
    Peru (1542–1824)
    Puerto Rico (until 1898)
    Rio de la Plata (1776–1814)
    Santo Domingo (last Spanish rule 1861-1865)

Swedish

    New Sweden (1638–1655)
    Saint Barthélemy (1785–1878)
    Guadeloupe (1813–1815)

 

[Sanotra]

I want to play as the Scottish! Home of me Ancestors! Yarr!

 

[Isabelxxx]

I want to play as the Scottish! Home of me Ancestors! Yarr!

It should be possible soon.

Any opinion about the implementation? There are many possibilities here:

I think that some minor nations are so smaller to be playable. This is something we have to discuss but anyway here are the possibilities:

1) Add some of these nations to the game as playable. For ex there are some "almost historically obligatory": Denmark, Prussia
Others more optional according to some concepts: Russia, Sweden
And others as personal enjoyment for some players but historically irrelevant: Scotland, Courtland, etc. No DLL work.

2) Instead of starting in 1492, some of these nations could appear as events later. They would start with some ships & colonist and that minor nation would try to colonize small regions.
This open a new route to Europe interaction... Requires DLL work.

3) Minor nations as an option to be enabled/disabled in custom games. Those who want them will only need to check the option. Minimal DLL work.

4) Create new tag for nations where we could adjust the starting time, maps in which these nations would be enabled (so we could disable Russians in Caribbean maps but enable them in Alaska maps; note I'm currently working on maps), etc. Medium DLL work & required to add those tags to the maps & map scripts.

These are just some unpolished ideas which will be discussed later.

You could like Scotland in your game but I'm sure many will not want this because of the 1st) paragraph...

Anyway, In my opinion I's better a complete mod than a "fan mod". These minor nations could be easily enabled/disabled in game just by adding that option in custom games as suggested in 3). That makes the mod more complete and still maintains the coherence; I would prefer to play with all the possibilities.

Later we could add other ways to implement those extra nations in game as suggested in 2) and 4) while maintaining the historical coherence.

 

[Sanotra]

If you wanted to do something really radical, than here's a suggestion. Bring in each specific nation at a historically relevant time in the game. I would have to research which colonies established their colonies first, but a fictitious example of this idea is included below.

Spain is the first nation to establish a colony in the new world. Start year 1492. Dutch are second, 1530. French, 1578. British, 1608.

If a player wants to play as Spain in this example. A ship is spawned at the start location, and the year is 1492. The player plays as Spain, setting up the beginning of his colonial empire. Up until the year 1530, 38 turns later, the Spanish player is alone. Spain has the New World all to itself for the first 38 turns of gameplay. At turn 38, 1530AD, the Dutch vessel appears on the map and starts playing. The French 48 turns later, and the British 30 turns after that.

If the player opts to play as the French, he starts in the year 1578. Spain and Netherlands are already on the map, with a set number of colonies adjusted by the difficulty, with the Dutch having fewer colonies than the Spanish. If the player opts to play as the British, he would show up in 1608, and greet the other much larger established colonies.

1776 would be the deadline for all declarations of independence (optional). And those with smaller colonies, because they showed up late, would have to face a smaller REF.

I know this is a complete overhaul of the game, and would be difficult to implement, but it sounds fun to me.

 

[Isabelxxx]

I have thought that, but there are some things to consider:

1) How many turns could play the last nation which colonized America? At first we want to enjoy the game.
Col 1 let you play in a relaxed way with more than 800 turns... now col 2 have many less turns. Then if we play with some nations the number would be smaller...
It should not be a problem if we add many more turns to the game.

2) Difficulty to make the things work as intended.

3) It will change the game to be more linear since you should know when certain event will happen. The problem here is that this event is so important that could make you feel all games are equal. I certainly would like this implementation as other possibility in custom games but I'm not sure about having that by default.

4) To make the game less linear the AI colonies should be improved. This is a problem still present in the game as it is. If we introduce some AI nations later I would like to see some challenge there.
It's not only that you have to defeat REF but the game should also add interaction with the other nations and therefore nations which colonized Europe later were not necessarily less important or weaker. You would not mind to see England coming later to America if you really feel that the introduction of a new nation really adds something to your game, something different each time.




In fact it should not be so difficult because we want to start in historical dates but having completely random events, AI strength, scenarios to encounter, etc.
From that point of view the game mechanics are the same and we only add an extra to ensure some logic as you suggested.

If the player opts to play as the French, he starts in the year 1578. Spain and Netherlands are already on the map, with a set number of colonies adjusted by the difficulty, with the Dutch having fewer colonies than the Spanish. If the player opts to play as the British, he would show up in 1608, and greet the other much larger established colonies.

I certainly consider this implementation but it is not really necessary to start doing that now, if we make things right since the beginning that possibility could be easily added in the future without too much work because 38 turns more or less will not affect anything in this mod with the present mechanics for creating new settlements.

 

[Sanotra]

Yeah, I see how it would make it more linear. A way to remove the rigged linear anticipation of the arrival of a new nation, would be to create a date range, in which the nation appears. Instead of 1608 for the British, the British would randomly appear somewhere between 1585 and 1625, a forty year window. If you chose to play as the British, your start year would be randomly chosen somewhere in this 40 year window.

I understand what you're saying about the need for a more dynamic environment when it comes to interaction between the European nations. I have nothing for you on that one, at the moment.

 

[Isabelxxx]

Yeah, I see how it would make it more linear. A way to remove the rigged linear anticipation of the arrival of a new nation, would be to create a date range, in which the nation appears. Instead of 1608 for the British, the British would randomly appear somewhere between 1585 and 1625, a forty year window. If you chose to play as the British, your start year would be randomly chosen somewhere in this 40 year window.

Of course, that would be the right way to do it. Also events or something like that could change the date a bit. But not only the date, also the starting units, relations, etc.

I understand what you're saying about the need for a more dynamic environment when it comes to interaction between the European nations. I have nothing for you on that one, at the moment.

I have many ideas for that. That's why I said that probably the right way to implement that is starting adding Interaction between nations base and then the dynamic starting date.